When Boise native Dan Isla was a boy, he dreamed of space exploration and becoming an astronaut. While studying at Boise State University, he decided he wanted to be an engineer.

"Some day, maybe I'll be both," said Isla, 25, a spring BSU graduate who started his new job at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., on June 15. "I definitely see myself working within the different NASA centers for the rest of my career."

Two of Isla's engineering classmates - T.J. Anderson and wife, Haley Anderson - also have landed work in the aerospace industry. They're helping design the next spacesuit.

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory builds and operates planetary spacecraft and operates NASA's Deep Space Network. Isla completed a 10-week internship there on the Deep Impact comet probe last summer and was offered a job when he obtained his degree in electrical and computer engineering.

Even for top students like Isla, it's heady stuff to land a job at NASA - particularly during a recession that's making it difficult for college grads entering the job market.

"I'm very fortunate to have a job right out of college and to be at NASA. It's like all my dreams are coming true," Isla said in a phone interview this week from Pasadena.

"It's a really big deal to have these students off working these jobs," said former space shuttle astronaut Barbara Morgan, who last year became a distinguished educator in residence at BSU.

"They are the future of the program. As the work force continues to age at NASA, we need young people going into the field," Morgan said.

It's also a pivotal time for NASA, which in July will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, as it works to develop new rockets to resume trips to the moon by 2020 as part of its Constellation program. If fully funded, NASA's plan is to create a lunar base and then launch missions to Mars.

T.J. and Haley Anderson are working for NASA Houston-based contractor Oceaneering Space Systems Inc. Oceaneering won the NASA contract to design and produce spacesuits for the Constellation program, which includes proposed missions to the moon and Mars. The contract is worth up to $745 million.

T.J. Anderson, a senior in materials science at BSU, already is testing materials for space flight vehicles and spacesuits.

"What I'm really kind of excited about is the satisfaction that comes with the longevity of the project. Once it's done, you know everything about it and you can say, 'I helped build that,' " Anderson said.

Anderson, 26, who previously worked as an intern at NASA in Langley, Va., has a paid internship with Oceaneering that likely will lead to a job when he completes his degree later this year.

He has one upper-level materials science class to finish at BSU before he graduates. His graduation was delayed because he had to have reconstructive surgery on his knee after a bike accident.

Haley Anderson, 23, a native Tennesseean who met T.J. at Boise State, received her degree in mechanical engineering.

She coordinates communication, schedules, budgets, documentation and testing. She feels comfortable working in aerospace, in part because she grew up in it - her dad designed the solar panels for the International Space Station and currently works for Jacobs Engineering at NASA Langley.

"I think the moves toward innovation and the new space program are excellent and long-needed. I hope that my generation and future generations will get as excited about space exploration as the generation before us," she said.

Isla was hired to work on the Ground Data System at JPL. The lifelong Boisean is now living in an apartment about eight miles from JPL's campus in Pasadena, Calif.

"The Ground Data System is how you get messages or data from your spacecraft back to Earth processed and displayed for the flight controller or engineer - any pictures of the Martian surface, stars or data of planetary systems," Isla said. "Every message from NASA's rovers and deep-space craft goes through this network."

Katy Moeller: 377-6413